The Constant Princess (Boleyn)
by Philippa Gregory
|
List Price: Our Price: $0.75 You Save: $15.25 (95%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of The Constant Princess (Boleyn)
Book Review: The Constant Princess
Summary: 3 Stars
The Constant Princess by Philippa Gregory was a good book. I liked how Philippa wrote everyone's point of view and then what Catalina was thinking. I think she brings the Tudor court alive with her writing. I also read her book The Other Boleyn Girl which one of my favorites. Once you start reading The Constant Princess it is hard to put done.
The Constant Princess is about Infanta Of Spain Catalina she is raised in the most beautiful Moorish Palace in the world. Then when she is 15 she travels to England to marry Prince Arthur. After they marry they go to Ludlow. There they fall passionately in love. Soon after Arthur falls sick. On his deathbed he makes Catalina promise to marry Harry his brother so she can become Queen and make the kingdom that her and Arthur dreamed of. When she gets back to London she tells the king that the marriage was consummated with Arthur so she could marry Harry. But King wants to marry Catalina, so he proposes. She refuses because once the king dies she will just a Dowager Queen, she wants her son to be king. So after waiting seven long years of spies, poverty, and family trouble. She finally marries Harry a couple months later they become King Henry the 8th and Queen Catharine. But many problems lie ahead. War with the Scots, getting a heir, and losing Henry interest and money...
This book has lots of suspenseful, sad, and romantic parts in it. I think it was to much like a romantic novel and it was not has historically accurate as some of her other novels. It is very descriptive you can almost see the castle and small the food and touch the silk .The ending of the book was bad it left me wanting more. It was not her best novel but it was good. I recommend this book to people who are mature, like romance and adventure. I hope to read more of Philippa Gregory in the future.
Book Review: The Constant Princess
Summary: 3 Stars
This is a historical novelization of Queen Katherine of Aragon, first wife of King Henry VIII. It starts with Katherine(Catalina) as a child and ends when Anne Boleyn is in the process of usurping her as Henry VIII's wife.
The first half of the book was interesting with the portrayal of 15th/16th century Europe and the making of political alliances between countries. It showed that royal parents such as Ferdinand/Isabella and Henry VII/Elizabeth viewed their offspring more as chess pieces than family members. This seems to be the historical part. The fiction part seems to be portraying Katherine and Arthur as a royal couple that fall in love (serendipity!). She has Katherine and Arthur consummate their marriage as well. The future king Henry VIII is attracted to Katherine. If I wanted to have only history I'd stay with Alison Weir or Antonia Fraser. I don't object to this.
The novel seemed to go astray by portraying Queen Katherine with 20th/21st politically correct sensibilities. Spain bore the brunt of struggles against the Moslems during her life. It's a little easy that her family would have been so discerning to surgically excise what they didn't like about Moslems, and appreciate what was positive(their advances in science and medicine). I doubt Queen Katherine would have been so appreciative of it.
What I would have liked to see:
-The rivalry of Katherine and Anne Boleyn.
-The years when Mary Tudor was a child.
To me it seemed that after the battle against King James of Scotland, it was fast forwarded to her divorce with Henry VIII. I had the impression that her editors were hurrying the author to get another Tudor Era historical novel to the printing presses. I was a little disappointed after reading "The Other Boleyn Girl".
Book Review: The Best of the Tudor Series
Summary: 4 Stars
Catalina is daughter of two of the greatest monarch's Europe has seen. She has known since she was three that in addition to being an Infanta of Spain she is the Princess of Wales and will one day be Queen of England. Nothing will stop her from claiming these titles that she see's as her birth right. Not the death of her first husband Arthur, her parents refusal to pay the rest of her dowry or her inability to secure a betrothal to Arthur's younger brother, Harry.
I'm a Gregory fan, for the most part. There are always things about her novels that make them slightly irritating, but that rarely effects the breakneck pace I read them at. The Constant Princess was no different. I really enjoyed Catalina/Katherine's thoughts and life as she journeyed from Spain to England. Her life is usually thought of as the First wife of Henry VIII, the woman set aside for Anne Boleyn, and the mother of 'Bloody" Mary I. It was nice to see her young and in love, even if her first, love filled marriage is short.
Her time waiting to become princess again is a bit long. Catalina's italicized thoughts take up pages and pages where before they book up a page at the very most. Her waiting and scheming would be very irritating if you didn't know she would be successful. All the odds are against her and her attitude, as well as Henry VII and his mother Margaret Beaufort are irritating.
Her actual reign as Henry's queen is more interesting and gives a lot of insigt into a time I didn't know much about. She was a much stronger woman that I would have previously given her credit for. I'd been putting off reading The Constant Princess because Katherine didn't interest me as much as Henry's other wives/other historical women, but I'm glad I did pick it up. A very enjoyable read.
Book Review: Wondering if I can possibly top this book in 2008 - and it's only March!
Summary: 5 Stars
After seeing The Other Boleyn Girl in the theatre, I decided to read the book. While waiting for it to come in from amazon, I picked up a copy of The Constant Princess at a local store to pass the time and find out more about Henry VIII's first wife and queen, Catalina, The Infanta of Spain, Katherine, Queen of England.
This book starts out with Catalina at the age of 3 and continues until the turmoil surrounding the Boleyn debacle, however the Boleyn debacle is not widely covered. Instead, an intense understanding of who Katherine is and the changes she goes through in her heart through the years are discovered. Catalina, born and bred to reign and bound by unforeseen promises must fulfill her destiny and in the process grow from a girl to a woman and a true Queen. We also get a clear picture of Henry VIII from childhood through adulthood.
Intensely satisfying, deeply moving, and yearnfully heartfelt, this novel will take you places in your thoughts that you were not expecting. You will pore over the ideas presented, and wonder over the scenarios and reactions of the characters involved. You will live the events of Katherine's life as if you were she, or perhaps one of her ladies in waiting.
Full of suspense, betrayal, misunderstanding, longful yearning, tenacity, and the exposure of the dark thoughts of the every person's inner heart, this book will remind you that we are indeed all human, from the peasant to the royal. A quick, and satisfying read, this one will have you turning pages long after the lights should be out for a restful night's sleep. Instead you'll be up late thinking about a woman who lived 500 years ago and half a world away.
A must read.
Book Review: Awful! Boring! Awful!
Summary: 1 Stars
A friend of mine LOVES Phillipa Gregory, and she encouraged me to start with this one saying, "It's not the best book, but it has good background information." Understatement. It's definitely NOT the best book and the background information can't possibly be worth the time I just invested in it.
Whatever you do, do not spend money on this book. If you MUST read it, BORROW it! I got to page 160 and nearly quit reading it after seeing that all the 1-star reviews here on Amazon were saying what I was already feeling about the book. It got mildly better in the 2nd third of the book, but then awful in the last third again.
The book is written in 3rd and 1st person narrative, the 1st person being all in italics which is jarring and distracting. It's choppy and repetitive. I started skipping those sections entirely, but the last third of the book is practically all italics, and I don't know why.
I'll save you the trouble of reading it. Here are the bullet points:
-- Catherine of Aragon was betrothed to Arthur, son of King Henry VII, first Tudor king;
-- she repeatedly refers to herself as "Infanta of Spain, Princess of Wales, Queen of England";
-- she marries Arthur, consummates the marriage (contrary to actual history), loves him passionately;
-- he dies;
-- she spends years in poverty waiting to marry Henry VIII;
-- she has a miscarriage and a newborn death;
-- there's some war with France and Scotland;
-- there are two pages of a courtroom scene after Henry falls for Anne Boleyn;
-- thank God, the end of the book!!!
Wikipedia would be far more interesting (and quicker) to read.